1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to systems and methods for producing gas-to-liquids products. More particularly, embodiments relate to systems and methods for producing gas-to-liquids products using reactive distillation.
2. Description of the Related Art
Hydrocarbon gases can be reacted to provide liquid hydrocarbon materials, such as diesel and/or gasoline components, and other useful products. Such reactions are typically catalyzed using Fixed bed or slurry reactors. A disadvantage, however, of using a fixed bed or slurry reactor configuration is that a wide variety of molecular-weight compounds are present within the reactor at one time.
In a Fischer-Tropsch reaction, for example, the molecular chains continue to grow as long as the reactants and products remain in contact with the catalyst. There is little control over chain growth in a fixed bed or slurry reactor, which causes undesirable high molecular-weight products, such as heavy hydrocarbon waxes to be produced. These waxy products are prone to poisoning and/or fouling the reaction catalyst more quickly than lower molecular-weight products. Furthermore, if the desired products are gasoline and diesel, for example, such heavy hydrocarbons are beyond the desired molecular-weight range.
Additional steps to purify the intended products are usually required to mitigate such disadvantages. Conventional methods for removing the unwanted heavy hydrocarbons, however, require additional hydrocracking equipment to crack the heavy hydrocarbons to provide products within the desired molecular-weight range. This additional equipment is expensive to construct, install, maintain, and operate. Such additional equipment is also energy intensive and adds to the footprint of the overall process.
There is a need, therefore, for improved systems and methods for reacting gases derived from hydrocarbons to provide products having a reduced amount of unwanted heavy hydrocarbons.